Make a round of the troops immediately after a battle, or even the next
day after, before the reports have been drawn up, and ask any of the soldiers
and senior and junior officers how the affair went: you will be told what
all these men experienced and saw, and you will form a majestic, complex,
infinitely varied, depressing, and indistinct impression; and from no one-least
of all from the commander in chief-will you learn what the whole affair
was like.

LEO TOLSTOY, SomeWordsAboutWarandPeace

General Walker's primary objective in August was to retain a foothold
in Korea. From this he intended to launch an attack later when his forces
were of sufficient strength. Walker kept saying to his key staff officers
and to his principal commanders substantially the following: "You
keep your mind on the fact that we will win this thing by attacking. Never
let an opportunity to attack pass. I want the capability and opportunity
to pass to the offensive. Until that time comes I want all commanders to
attack-to raid-to capture prisoners and thus keep the enemy off balance.
If that is done, more and more opportunities to hurt the enemy will arise
and our troops will be better prepared to pass to a general offensive when
things are ripe. [1]

General Walker wanted the foothold in Korea to include the rail route
from Pusan north through Miryang to Taegu, eastward to Kyongju, and back
to Pusan. (SeeMapIV.) This would make possible the
logistical support necessary for a breakout offensive later. To retain
this circumferential communication net, General Walker had to combine a
fine sense of timing with a judicious use of the small reserves he was
able to assemble at any given time. [2] He had to know just when to move
his limited reserves and where. They had to be at the right place and not
too late. A study of the defensive fighting of the Pusan Perimeter by Eighth
Army and the ROK Army will reveal that Walker proved himself a master in
it.

The difficulty of forming a small reserve was one of the principal problems
that confronted the Eighth Army staff

during August and September 1950. It was a daily concern to the Eighth
Army commander. Colonel Landrum, Eighth Army's chief of staff during August,
considered it one of his most important daily tasks to find any unit that
could be "tagged" as an army reserve. This search included both
Eighth Army and ROK troops. It was considered a certainty that any troops
so designated would be committed somewhere on the Perimeter within twenty-four
to forty-eight hours. One of General Walker's daily greetings to his chief
of staff was, "Landrum, how many reserves have you dug up for me today?"
[3]

General Walker left most of the headquarters work to his staff. He spent
the greater part of each day on visits to his combat units. It fell to
Colonel Landrum to keep him fully informed of what had happened around
the Perimeter front during his absence from headquarters. Landrum did this
every day when Walker returned to Taegu. In addition to keeping in close
touch with the army G-2, G-3, and G-3, Air, Colonel Landrum made it a practice
to telephone each major combat unit sometime between 2200 and midnight
each night and talk with the unit commander or the chief off staff about
the situation on that part of the front. This provided fresh information
and reflected the state of mind of the various commanders at that moment.
On the basis of these nightly telephone calls, General Walker often planned
his trips the next day. He went where he felt a serious situation was or
might be developing. [4]

The central, or Taegu, front was to present its full measure of problems
involving the use of limited reserves hastily assembled from another part
of the perimeter. It was a sector where the Eighth Army commander needed
to make a reasonably correct appraisal of the situation day by day. For
here several corridors of approach southward converged on the valley of
the Naktong, and the enemy forces advancing down these corridors were assembling
in relatively great strength in close supporting distance of each other.
The enemy frontal pressure against Taegu developed concurrently with that
on both flanks already described.

TheNorthKoreansCrosstheNaktongfortheAttackonTaegu

The enemy forces assembled in an arc around Taegu, from south to north,
were the N.K. 10th, 3d, 15th, 13th, and 1stDivisions, and elements of the 105thArmoredDivision.
They reached from Tuksong-dong on the south northward around Waegwan to
Kunwi. [5] This concentration north and west of Taegu indicated that the
North Koreans expected to use the natural corridor of the Naktong valley
from Sangju to Taegu as a principal axis of attack in the next phase of
their drive south. [6] (Map13)

Across the Naktong opposite the five North Korean divisions, in early
August, were, from south to north, the U.S. 1st Cavalry Division and the
ROK 1st

and 6th Divisions of the ROK II Corps. The boundary between the 1st
Cavalry Division and the ROK 1st Division lay about two miles north of
Waegwan and ten air miles northwest of Taegu. The 70thDivision
and part of the 3dDivision were opposite the 1st Cavalry
Division. Opposite the ROK 1st and 6th Divisions were part of the 3d,
and the 15th, 13th, and 1stDivisions, together
with supporting units of the 105th ArmoredDivision.

Like the 24th Infantry Division just south of it, the 1st Cavalry Division
had a long front. From south to north, the 7th, 8th, and 5th Cavalry Regiments
were on line in that order. The two battalions of the 8th Cavalry Regiment
west of Taegu each had a front of about 10,000 yards. The 5th Cavalry Regiment
at Waegwan had a front of 14,000 yards. [7] In order to provide artillery
fire support for such great frontages, the artillery firing batteries were
placed about 7,000 yards behind the front lines and about 6,000 to 7,000
yards apart. Each battery laid its guns on two different deflections. By
shifting trails it was possible to mass the battery fire. In some instances,
two batteries could mass their fire, but an entire artillery battalion
could not do so because of the great flank distance within a regimental
sector. The artillery tried to achieve volume of fire by rapidity of firing.
In one instance, ten 105-mm. howitzers fired 120 rounds in seventy seconds,
an average of one round every six seconds for each gun. [8]

In the north, the N.K. 1stDivision between 6 and 8 August
crossed the Naktong River between Hamch'ang and Sangju in the zone of the
ROK 6th Division. On 6 August, American planes observed ten barges engaged
in ferrying troops across the river. The enemy division, although reinforced
by 2,500 green replacement troops-partly at Hamch'ang and partly after
crossing the river-was still only at half-strength. Many of the replacements
did not have weapons and were used in rear areas in miscellaneous duties.
This division, upon attacking toward Kunwi, met stubborn resistance from
the ROK 6th Division and did not reach that town, twenty-five air miles
due north of Taegu, until about 17 August. In battle there with the ROK
6th Division, it suffered further losses before it was able to advance
south to the Tabu-dong area and the approaches to Taegu. [9]

South of the N.K. 1stDivision, the 13thDivision
had started crossing the Naktong during the night of 4-5 August. On the
5th the main part of its 21stRegiment crossed at Naktong-ni,
forty air miles northwest of Taegu on the Sangju road. After the crossing
was discovered, some of the enemy soldiers came under aerial strafing attacks
while they were still in the water and ROK artillery and mortar fire was
directed at the crossing site. On the south bank the regiment came under
continuing aerial and artillery fire, but with unknown casualties. That
night the 19thRegiment crossed the river in the path of
the 21st the men holding their weapons over their heads and wading
in neck-

deep water. They left behind their heavy weapons and vehicles. Then
the following night, 6-7 August, the third regiment of the division, the
23d, together with two battalions of artillery, crossed below Naktong-ni
on rafts. These crossings of the N.K. 13thDivision were
in the zone of the ROK 1st Division, but were several miles from that division's
prepared positions. [10]

ROK troops attacked the 13thDivision immediately after
it crossed, forcing it into the mountains. There, the N.K. 13thDivision, its elements uniting on the east side, launched a concerted
night attack, broke the ROK defenses, and began an advance that carried
it twenty miles southeast of Naktong-ni on the main road to Taegu. A week
after crossing the Naktong, the 13thDivision and the 1stDivision were converging on the Tabu-dong area, about fifteen miles
due north of Taegu. There lay the critical terrain for the northern defense
of the city. [11]

The N.K. 15thDivision, next of the enemy divisions in
line southward, received approximately 1,500 replacements at Kumch'on on
5 August, which brought its strength to about 6,500 men. The next day its
45thRegiment marched northeast toward the Naktong. The regiment
passed through Sonsan on 7 August and crossed the river southeast of that
town. United Nations planes strafed part of it in the crossing. Once across
the river, the regiment headed into the mountains, encountering no opposition
at first. The other two regiments, the 48th and 50th, departed
Kumch'on later and began crossing the Naktong between Indong and Waegwan
before dawn of 8 August. The men waded the river in four feet of water
at two ferry sites, four and six miles north of Waegwan. Tanks and vehicles
crossed on an underwater bridge at the upper ferry site. The major initial
crossing occurred at the upper ferry site six miles from Waegwan where
an estimated two battalions and at least two tanks had crossed by 0810.
The North Koreans supported this crossing by direct tank fire from the
west side of the river. The Air Force estimated seven tanks were in firing
position there. These tanks evidently succeeded in crossing the river during
the day. The N.K. 15thDivision seized Hills 201 and 346
on the east side of the river at the crossing site, before advancing eastward
into the mountains toward Tabu-dong, seven air miles distant. [12]

Considering these enemy crossings the most serious threat yet to appear
against Taegu, Eighth Army made plans to support the ROK Army with American
troops in the event of an enemy penetration. The Air Force, in the meantime,
discovered the underwater bridge six miles north of Waegwan and dropped
1,000-pound bombs on it with undetermined results. [13]

reported it had regained the high ground at the crossing sites. The
enemy force, however, had not been destroyed or driven back across the
river. It had simply moved on eastward deeper into the mountains. Between
12 and 16 August the three regiments of the N.K. 15th Division united
on the east side of the Naktong in the vicinity of Yuhak-san, a towering
2,800-foot peak, five miles east of the crossing site and three miles northwest
of Tabu-dong. The N.K. 13thDivision was already locked in
combat on Yuhak-san with the ROK 1st Division. [14]

Opposite, and south of, Waegwan, two enemy divisions stood ready to
cross the Naktong in a co-ordinated attack with the divisions to the north.
The first of these, the N.K. 3dDivision, was concentrated
in the vicinity of Songju, four miles southwest of Waegwan. Ten miles below
the 3d, the N.K. 10thDivision was concentrated in
the Koryong area. Both these divisions were opposite the 1st Cavalry Division.

The 7thRegiment of the 3dDivision started
crossing the Naktong about 0300 9 August at a ferry site near the village
of Noch'on, two miles south of the Waegwan bridge. The river at this point
had a firm sandy bottom and a depth of five feet. The troops waded across
holding their weapons above the water. Discovering the crossing, elements
of the 5th Cavalry Regiment directed automatic weapons fire against the
enemy force and called in pre-registered artillery fire on the crossing
site. Although the enemy regiment suffered some casualties, the bulk of
it reached the east bank safely and moved inland into the hills. [15] One
of the soldiers wrote in his diary of the crossing:

Gradually advanced toward the river. Enemy shelling is fierce. Arrived
at the shores of the river. The terrible enemy has sent up flares. The
Naktong River is flowing quietly and evenly. Entered the river. After advancing
200 meters, shooting began with the firing of an enemy flare. The noise
is ringing in my ears. Have already crossed the river. Occupied a hill.
A new day is already breaking. [16]

Half an hour after the 7thRegiment had crossed, the 8th
and 9thRegiments started crossing the river south of it.
By this time, the 5th Cavalry Regiment and all its supporting mortars and
artillery were fully alerted. Flares and star shells brightly illuminated
these two North Korean regiments in midstream. American fire from all supporting
weapons, with the artillery playing the dominant role, decimated the enemy
troops and turned them back to the west side. Only a small number reached
the east side. There, either they were captured or they hid until the next
night when they recrossed the river. [17]

At daylight, 9 August, General Gay at 1st Cavalry Division headquarters
in Taegu learned of the enemy crossing in his division sector south of
Waegwan. As first reports were vague, he decided to withhold action until
he learned more about the situation. A report informed him that 1st Lt.
Harry A. Buckley, Acting S-2, 5th Cavalry Regiment, had personal knowledge
of the enemy crossing. General Gay sent for the lieutenant and, while awaiting
his arrival, placed the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, in reserve
on one-hour alert.

Upon reporting to General Gay at the division headquarters, Lieutenant
Buckley stated:

Just prior to daylight this morning, I, with a small group of men from
the I&R Platoon, was on reconnaissance. Approximately 45 minutes prior
to daylight, I observed enemy forces moving up the ridge line just northwest
of Hill 268. The enemy were moving at a dog trot in groups of four. Every
fourth man carried an automatic weapon, either a light machine gun or a
burp gun. I watched them until they had all disappeared into the brush
on Hill 268. In my opinion, and I counted them carefully, the enemy was
in strength of a reinforced battalion, approximately 750 men. General,
I am not a very excitable person and I know what I saw, when I saw it,
where I was when I saw it, and where the enemy was going. [18]

A few minutes later, General Walker arrived at the division headquarters.
He asked General Gay what his plans were. The latter replied that at least
an enemy battalion had crossed the Naktong and was on Hill 268, that another
enemy regiment was at that moment trying to cross the river under heavy
fire from the 5th Cavalry Regiment, and that as soon as he was sure of
his ground he was going to attack the enemy on Hill 268 and drive them
back across the river. Walker commented, "Fine, be sure you are right
before you move because this enemy battalion might be a feint and the real
attack could well be coming farther to the left. [19] Events were later
to prove this possibility correct.

At 0930, 9 August, General Gay ordered Lt. Col. Peter D. Clainos, commanding
the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, to eliminate the enemy penetration.
The battalion moved at once from its bivouac area just outside of Taegu,
accompanied by five tanks of A Company, 71st Heavy Tank Battalion. This
motorized force proceeded to the foot of Hill 268, also known as Triangulation
Hill, three miles southeast of Waegwan and ten air miles northwest of Taegu.
The 61st Field Artillery Battalion meanwhile heavily shelled the hill.
The hill was doubly important because of its proximity to lines of communication.
The main Korean north-south highway from time immemorial, and the main
double-track Pusan-Seoul-Harbin, Manchuria, railroad skirted its base.
[20]

At noon the artillery fired a preparation on Hill 268, and the 1st Battalion
then attacked it under orders to continue on southwest to Hill 154. Hill
268 was covered with thick brush about four feet high and some trees eight
to ten

feet high. The day was very hot. Many 1st Battalion soldiers collapsed
from heat exhaustion during the attack, which was not well co-ordinated
with artillery fire. The enemy repulsed the attack. [21]

The next morning, 10 August, air strikes and artillery preparations
blasted Hill 268. According to prisoners, these fires caused extremely
heavy losses and created chaos in the enemy regiment.

During the morning, the assistant division commander, the chief of staff,
the G-2, and several military police were ambushed and nearly all wounded
on the Waegwan road at Hill 268. That afternoon, General Gay and his aide
stopped near Hill 268 to talk with the 1st Battalion executive officer
and a small group of men. An enemy mortar shell made a direct hit on the
group, killing or wounding everyone there except Gay and his aide. Gay
ordered five tanks to proceed along the Waegwan road until they could fire
from the northwest into the reverse slope of the enemy-held hill. This
tank fire caught the enemy soldiers there as they were seeking refuge from
the artillery fire. Trapped between the two fires they started to vacate
their positions. An infantry attack then reached the top of the hill without
trouble and the battle was over by 1600. American artillery and mortar
fire now shifted westward and cut off the enemy retreat. One time-on-target
mission of white phosphorus fired by the 61st Field Artillery Battalion
at this time caught a large number of enemy soldiers in a village where
American ground troops later found 200 enemy dead. That evening the 1st
Battalion, 7th Cavalry, reverted to division reserve, and elements of the
5th Cavalry

When Hill 268 was examined carefully on 13 August, the enemy dead, equipment,
and documents found there indicated that the 7thRegiment
of the N.K. 3dDivision had been largely destroyed. The 1st
Battalion, 7th Cavalry, counted between 300 and 400 enemy dead in the battle
area. The battalion itself suffered 14 men killed, and 48 wounded in the
2-day battle. [23]

Prisoners taken in the final action which cleared Hill 268 agreed substantially
that about 1,000 men of the 7thRegiment had crossed the
Naktong to Hill 268, and that about 700 of them became casualties. The
prisoners also agreed that artillery and mortars had inflicted most of
the crippling casualties on the regiment. After crossing to the east side
of the Naktong, the enemy regiment had received no food or ammunition supply.
An estimated 300 survivors recrossed the river to the west side the night
of 10-11 August. [24]

The N.K. 3dDivision's attempted crossing of the Naktong
south of Waegwan had ended in catastrophe. When the survivors of the 7thRegiment rejoined the division on or about 12 August, the once mighty
3dDivision was reduced to a disorganized unit of some 2,500
men. The North Korean Army placed the division in reserve to be rebuilt
by replacements. [25] This division, which had been the first to enter
Seoul at the beginning of the war, fought the battle of Choch'iwon, crossed
the Kum River before Taejon and defeated the 18th Infantry there, joined
subsequently with the 4thDivision in the capture of Taejon,
and drove the 1st Cavalry Division from Yongdong, was now temporarily out
of the fight for Taegu.

TheEnemy10thDivision'sCrossingatYongp'o

The North Korean plan for the attack against Taegu from the west and
southwest had called for the N.K. 10thDivision to make a
co-ordinated attack with the N.K. 3dDivision. The 10th
Division so far had not been in combat. It had started from Sukch'on for
the front by rail about 25 July. At Ch'onan it left the trains and continued
southward on foot, passing through Taejon and arriving at the Naktong opposite
Waegwan on or about 8 August. There it received its combat orders two days
later. Its mission was to cross the Naktong River in the vicinity of Tuksong-dong,
penetrate east, and cut the Taegu-Pusan main supply road. The division
assembled in the Koryong area the next day, 11 August. There it was astride
the main highway running northeast to Taegu over a partially destroyed
Naktong bridge. [26]

Eighth Army purposely had not completely destroyed this bridge; it was
passable for foot soldiers but not for

vehicles. In its partially destroyed condition it provided something
of a trap if used by an enemy crossing force, because the bridge and its
approaches channeled any enemy movement over it and were completely covered
by pre-registered mortar and artillery fire. To this was to be added the
fire of infantry weapons located in good defensive positions on the hills
near the river.

Two regiments of the N.K. 10th Division, the 29th
on the south and the 25th on the north, were to make the assault
crossing with the 27thRegiment in reserve. The commander
of the 25thRegiment issued an order on the eve of the crossing,
stating that the objective was to "destroy the enemy in Taegu City
in coordination with the 3d InfantryDivision." [27]

The 2d Battalion, 29thRegiment, was the first
unit of the division to cross the river. Its troops waded unopposed to
the east side, during the night of 11-12 August, at three ferry sites 3
to 5 miles due west of Hyongp'ung. This battalion climbed Hill 265, a northern
spur of Hill 409, 2 miles southwest of Hyongp'ung, and set up machine gun
positions. The other two battalions then crossed and occupied Hill 409.
About twenty to thirty men of the 1stBattalion reportedly
drowned in the 5-foot-deep swift current in this crossing. It will be recalled
that this enemy force in the Hill 409 area ambushed an I&R patrol from
the 21st Infantry Regiment of the 24th Division, on the morning of 12 August,
when it moved north along the river road trying to establish contact with
the 7th Cavalry Regiment during the battle of the Naktong Bulge. [28]

On the north flank, the 25thRegiment started crossing
the Naktong about 0300, 12 August, in the vicinity of the partially blown
highway bridge at Tuksong-dong, on the Koryong-Taegu road. The 2d Battalion,
7th Cavalry Regiment, covered this crossing site fourteen miles southwest
of Taegu. By daylight, an enemy force of 300 to 400 men had penetrated
to Wich'on-dong. There, H Company, 7th Cavalry Regiment, engaged it in
close combat. In a grenade and automatic weapons attack, the North Koreans
overran the advance positions of the company, the mortar observation post,
and the heavy machine gun positions. The initial enemy objective seemed
to be to gain possession of the high ground east of Yongp'o in order to
provide protection for the main crossing that was to follow. By 0900, however,
the 2d Battalion, with the powerful help of the 77th Field Artillery Battalion
and of air strikes, drove the enemy troops back through Yongp'o toward
the bridge and dispersed them. [23]

It could not be assumed that this failure would end the efforts of the
N.K. 10thDivision west of Taegu. In the three days from
10 to 12 August the Naktong River had dropped three feet and was only shoulder-deep
at many places. The opportunity for large-scale enemy crossings was at
hand. [30]

A more determined enemy crossing of the Naktong in the vicinity of the
blown bridge between Tuksong-dong and Yongp'o began about dawn, 14 August.
Men in the outposts of the 2d Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, at 0520
heard voices in the pea patches and rice paddies to their front. By 0620,
an estimated 500 enemy soldiers had penetrated as far as Yongp'o. Fifteen
minutes later, close combat was in progress in the 2d Battalion positions
near Wich'on-dong, a mile east of the crossing site. [31]

When word of the enemy crossing reached the 1st Cavalry Division command
post before daylight, General Gay alerted his division reserve, Colonel
Clainos' 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry, to move on an hour's notice. More
North Koreans crossed the river in the hours after daylight, and at 0800
General Gay ordered Colonel Clainos' battalion, already loaded into trucks,
to move to the Yongp'o area to support the 2d Battalion.

Enemy artillery and tank fire from the west side of the river was supporting
the crossing. At midmorning, large additional enemy forces just west of
the river at Tuksong-dong and Panjang apparently were about ready to attempt
a crossing in support of the units already heavily engaged on the east
side. Some enemy troops were crossing in barges near the bridge. Air strikes
bombed the North Koreans on the west side and artillery then took them
under heavy fire. The 77th Field Artillery Battalion fired approximately
1,860 rounds into the enemy concentration. In delivering this heavy, rapid
fire it damaged its gun tubes. [32]

In this attack the deepest North Korean penetration reached Samuni-dong,
about a mile and a half beyond the blown bridge. There the combined fire
of all infantry weapons, mortars, and artillery drove the enemy back toward
the river. By noon, large groups of North Koreans were trying to recross
the river to the west side. Forward observers adjusted artillery and mortar
fire on the retreating enemy, causing heavy casualties.

By dusk, the 7th cavalry had eliminated the enemy bridgehead at Yongp'o.
In this battle, as in the one fought two days before, the 2d Battalion
distinguished itself. This was the same battalion that only three weeks
earlier had performed in a highly unsatisfactory manner east of Yongdong.

In this river-crossing battle, the only major one to take place along
the Naktong actually at a crossing site, the 25th and 27thRegiments of the N.K. 70thDivision suffered crippling
losses. The 7th Cavalry Regiment estimated that of 1,700 enemy who had
succeeded in crossing the river, 1,500 were killed. Two days after the
battle, H Company reported it had buried 267 enemy dead behind its lines,
while those in the rice paddies to its front were not counted. In front
of its position, G Company counted 150 enemy dead. In contrast, G Company
lost only 2 men killed and 3 wounded during the battle. One of its members,
Pfc. Robert D. Robertson, a machine gunner, twice had bullets pierce his
helmet in the half-inch space above

his scalp and tear through several letters and photographs he carried
there, but leave him unhurt. [33]

Among the enemy dead were found the bodies of two colonels. Found, also,
were many enemy documents. One of these documents, dated 13 August, said
in part:

Kim Il Sung has directed that the war be carried out so that its final
victory can be realized by 15 August, fifth anniversary of the liberation
of Korea....

Our victory lies before our eyes. Young soldiers! You are fortunate
in that you are able to participate in the battle for our final victory.
Young soldiers, the capture of Taegu lies in the crossing of the Naktong
River ... The eyes of 30,000,000 people are fixed on the Naktong River
crossing operation ...

Pledge of all fighting men: We pledge with our life no matter what hardships
and sacrifice lies before us, to bear it and put forth our full effort
to conclude the crossing of the Naktong River. Young Men! Let us protect
our glorious pride by completely annihilating the enemy!! [34]

These words may have stirred the young soldiers of the N.K. 10thDivision but their promise was not fulfilled. Instead, the Naktong
valley and surrounding hills were to hold countless North Korean graves.
In its first combat mission, the crossing of the Naktong on 12-14 August,
the 10thDivision, according to prisoners, suffered 2,500
casualties, some units losing as much as 50 percent of their troops. [35]

Hill303atWaegwan

Almost simultaneously with the major enemy crossing effort in the southern
part of the 1st Cavalry Division sector at Tuksong-dong and Yongp'o, another
was taking place northward above Waegwan near the boundary between the
division and the ROK 1st Division. The northernmost unit of the 1st Cavalry
Division was G Company of the 5th Cavalry Regiment. It held Hill 303, the
right-flank anchor of the U.S. Eighth Army.

Hill 303 is an elongated oval more than two miles long on a northeast-southwest
axis with an extreme elevation of about 1,000 feet. It is the first hill
mass north of Waegwan. Its southern slope comes down to the edge of the
town; its crest, a little more than a mile to the northeast, towers nearly
950 feet above the river. It gives observation of Waegwan, the road net
running out of the town, the railroad and highway bridges across the river
at that point, and of long stretches of the river valley to the north and
to the south. Its western slope terminates at the east bank of the Naktong.
From Waegwan a road ran north and south along the east bank of the Naktong,
another northeast through the mountains toward Tabu-dong, and still another
southeast toward Taegu. Hill 303 was a critical terrain feature in control
of the main Pusan-Seoul railroad and highway crossing of the Naktong, as
well as of Waegwan itself.

For several days intelligence sources had reported heavy enemy concentrations
across the Naktong opposite the ROK 1st Division. In the first hours of
14 August, an enemy regiment crossed the Naktong six miles north of Waeg-

wan into the ROK 1st Division sector, over the second underwater bridge
there. Shortly after midnight, ROK forces on the high ground just north
of the U.S.-ROK Army boundary were under attack. After daylight an air
strike partially destroyed the underwater bridge. The North Korean attack
spread south and by noon enemy small arms fire fell on G Company, 5th Cavalry
Regiment, on Hill 303. This crossing differed from earlier ones near the
same place in that the enemy force instead of moving east into the mountains
turned south and headed for Waegwan. [36]

Before dawn, 15 August, G Company men on Hill 303 could make out about
fifty enemy troops accompanied by two tanks moving boldly south along the
river road at the base of the hill. They also saw another column moving
to their rear and soon heard it engage F Company with small arms fire.
In order to escape the enemy encirclement, F Company withdrew southward.
By 0830, North Koreans had completely surrounded G Company and a supporting
platoon of H Company mortarmen on Hill 303. A relief column, composed of
B Company, 5th Cavalry, and a platoon of tanks tried to reach G Company,
but enemy fire drove it back. [37]

Again on 16 August, B Company and the tanks tried unsuccessfully to
drive the enemy, now estimated to be a battalion of about 700 men, from
Hill 303. The 61st Field Artillery Battalion and three howitzers of B Battery,
82d Field Artillery Battalion, fired on the enemy-held hill during the
day. Waegwan was a no man's land. For the most part, the town was deserted.
Col. Marcel B. Crombez, the regimental commander, relieved the 2d Battalion
commander because he had lost control of his units and did not know where
they were. A new commander prepared to resume the attack. During the night,
G Company succeeded in escaping from Hill 303. [38]

Before dawn of the 17th, troops from both the 1st and 2d Battalions
of the 5th Cavalry Regiment, supported by A Company, 70th Tank Battalion,
attacked Hill 303, but heavy enemy mortar fire stopped them at the edge
of Waegwan. During the morning, heavy artillery preparations pounded the
enemy positions on Hill 303, the 61st Field Artillery Battalion alone firing
1,159 rounds. The 5th Cavalry at 1130 asked the division for assistance
and learned that the Air Force would deliver a strike on the hill at 1400.
[39]

The air strike came in as scheduled, the planes dropping napalm and
bombs, firing rockets, and strafing. The strike was on target and, together
with an artillery preparation, was dramatically successful. After the strike,
the infantry at 1530 attacked up the hill unopposed and secured it by 1630.
The combined strength of E and F Companies on top of the hill was about
sixty men. The artillery preparations and the air strike killed and wounded
an estimated 500 enemy troops on Hill 303. Approximately 200 enemy bodies
littered the hill. Survivors had fled in complete rout after the air strike.
[40]

TragedyonHill303

In regaining Hill 303 on 17 August the 5th Cavalry Regiment came upon
a pitiful scene-the bodies of twenty-six mortarmen of H Company, hands
tied in back, sprayed with burp gun bullets. First knowledge of the tragedy
came in the afternoon when scouts brought in a man from Hill 303, Pvt.
Roy Manring of the Heavy Mortar Platoon, who had been wounded in both legs
and one arm by burp gun slugs. Manring had crawled down the hill until
he saw scouts of the attacking force. After he told his story, some men
of the I&R Platoon of the 5th Cavalry Regiment under Lt. Paul Kelly
went forward, following Manring's directions, to the scene of the tragedy.
One of those present has described what they saw:

The boys lay packed tightly, shoulder to shoulder, lying on their sides,
curled like babies sleeping in the sun. Their feet, bloodied and bare,
from walking on the rocks, stuck out stiffly ... All had hands tied behind
their backs, some with cord, others with regular issue army communica-

The rest of the I&R Platoon circled the hill and captured two North
Korean soldiers. They proved to be members of the group that had captured
and held the mortarmen prisoners. From them and a third captured later,
as well as five survivors among the mortarmen, have come the following
details of what happened to the ill-fated group on Hill 303. [42]

Before dawn on Tuesday morning, 15 August, the mortar platoon became
aware of enemy activity near Hill 303. The platoon leader telephoned the
Commanding Officer, G Company, 5th Cavalry, who informed him that a platoon
of some sixty ROK's would come to reinforce the mortar platoon. About breakfast
time the men heard tank motors and saw two enemy tanks followed by 200
or more enemy soldiers on the road below them. A little later a group of
Koreans appeared on the slope. A patrol going to meet the climbing Koreans
called out and received in reply a blast of automatic weapons fire. The
mortar platoon leader, in spite of this, believed they were friendly. The
watching Americans were not convinced that they were enemy soldiers until
the red stars became visible on their caps. They were then close upon the
Americans. The North Koreans came right up to the foxholes without either
side firing a shot. Some pushed burp guns into the sides of the mortarmen
with one hand and held out the other as though to shake hands. One of the
enemy soldiers remarked later that "the American soldiers looked dazed."
[43]

The 4thCompany, 2dBattalion, 206thMechanizedInfantryRegimentof the 105thArmoredDivision, apparently were the captors, although some
members of HeadquartersCompany of the 45-mm. ArtilleryBattalion, 105thArmoredDivision, were present.
The North Koreans marched the prisoners down the hill after taking, their
weapons and valuables. In an orchard they tied the prisoners' hands behind
their backs, took some of their clothing, and removed their shoes. They
told the Americans they would send them to the Seoul prisoner of war camp
if they behaved well.

Apparently the original captors did not retain possession of the prisoners
throughout the next two days. There is some evidence that a company of
the N.K. 3dDivision guarded them after capture. It appears
that the enemy force that crossed the Naktong above Waegwan on the 14th
and turned south to

[41] Charles and Eugene Jones, TheFaceofWar, pp. 45-49. At least one
of the Jones brothers accompanied the I&R Platoon on this mission. See
also 5th Cav Regt WD, 17 Aug 50; 1st Cav Div WD, 17 Aug 50.
[42] JAG, Korean War Crimes, Case Nr 16, 17 Jul 53.
[43] Ibid., Statement of Chong Myong Tok, PW 216. The other North Korean
captured with Chong on 17 August was Kim Kwon Taek, PW 217. Heo Chang
Keun was the third prisoner who had personal knowledge of this incident.
It is not clear how many men were captured in the mortar platoon. The
5th Cav Regt WD, 17 Aug 50, said 41; one of the survivors said there
were 43; one of the captured North Koreans said about 40; and another
said about 45. For contemporary press reports of interviews with
survivors see New York HeraldTribune, August 18, 1950, quoting Cpl.
James M. Rudd; New York Times, August 18, 1950, account by Harold Faber
based on interview with Roy Manring; Life Magazine, September 4, 1950,
p. 36, based on interview with Cpl. Roy L. Day, Jr.; and Newsweek,
August 38, 1950, p. 25, for personal accounts.

THE TAEGU FRONT 349

Hill 303 and Waegwan was part of the 3dDivision and supporting
elements of the 105thArmoredDivision. In any event,
the first night the North Koreans gave their prisoners water, fruit, and
cigarettes. They intended to move them across the Naktong that night, but
American fire prevented it. During the night two of the Americans loosened
the shoe laces binding their wrists. This caused a commotion. At least
one of the survivors thought that a North Korean officer shot one of his
men who threatened to shoot the men who had tried to free their hands.

The next day, 16 August, the prisoners were moved around a great deal
with their guards. One of the mortarmen, Cpl. Roy L. Day, Jr., spoke Japanese
and could converse with some of the North Koreans. That afternoon he overheard
a North Korean lieutenant say that they would kill the prisoners if American
soldiers came too close. That night guards took away five of the Americans;
the others did not know what became of them.

On the morning of 17 August, the guards exchanged fire with U.S. soldiers.
Toward noon the North Korean unit holding the Americans placed them in
a gulley with a few guards. Then came the intense American artillery preparations
and the air strike on the hill. At this time a North Korean officer said
that American soldiers were closing in on them, that they could not continue
to hold the prisoners, and that they must be shot. The officer gave the
order and, according to one of those who participated, the entire company
of fifty men fired into the kneeling Americans as they rested in the gulley.
Some of the survivors said, however, that a group of 14 to so enemy soldiers
ran up when 2 of their guards yelled a signal and fired into them with
burp guns. Before all the enemy soldiers left the area, some of them came
back to the ravine and shot again those who were groaning. Cpl. James M.
Rudd escaped death from the blazing burp guns when the man at his side
fell dead on top of him. Rudd, hit three times in the legs and arms, burrowed
under the bodies of his fallen comrades for more protection. Four others
escaped in a similar way. Two of them in making their way down the hill
later were fired upon, but fortunately not hit, by 5th Cavalry soldiers
attacking up the hill, before they could establish their identity. [44]

That night additional atrocities occurred near Hill 303. Near Waegwan,
enemy antitank fire hit and knocked out two tanks of the 70th Tank Battalion.
The next day, 18 August, American troops found the bodies of six members
of the tank crews showing indications that they had been captured and executed.
[45]

These incidents on Hill 303 and vicinity caused General MacArthur on
20 August to broadcast an announcement to the North Korean Army and address
a leaflet to the Commander-in-Chief Armed Forces of North Korea, denouncing
the atrocities. The Air Force dropped the leaflets over North Korea in
large numbers. General MacArthur closed his message by saving:

Inertia on your part and on the part of your senior field commanders
in the discharge of this grave and universally recognized command responsibility
may only be construed as a condonation and encouragement of such outrage,
for which if not promptly corrected I shall hold you and your commanders
criminally accountable under the rules and precedents of war." [46]

There is no evidence that the North Korean High Command sanctioned the
shooting of prisoners during this phase of the war. What took place on
Hill 303 and elsewhere in the first months of the war appears to have been
perpetrated by uncontrolled small units, by vindictive individuals, or
because of unfavorable and increasingly desperate situations confronting
the captors. On 28 July 1950, General Lee Yong Ho, commanding the N.K.
3dDivision, transmitted an order pertaining to the treatment
of prisoners of war, signed by Kim Chaek, Commander-in-Chief, and Kang
Kon, Commanding General Staff, AdvancedGeneralHeadquarters
of the North Korean Army, which stated:

1. The unnecessary killing of enemy personnel when they could be taken
as PsW shall be strictly prohibited as of now. Those who surrender will
be taken as PsW, and all efforts will be made to destroy the enemy in thought
and politically.

2. Treatment of PsW shall be according to the regulations issued by
the Supreme Hq, as attached herein, pertaining to the regulation and order
of PW camps.

3. This directive will be explained to and understood by all military
personnel immediately, and staff members of the Cultural Section will be
responsible for seeing that this is carried out. [47]

Another document captured in September shows that the North Korean Army
was aware of the conduct of some of its soldiers and was somewhat concerned
about it. An order issued by the Cultural Section of the N.K. 2dDivision, 16 August 1950, said in part, "Some of us are still
slaughtering enemy troops that come to surrender. Therefore, the responsibility
of teaching the soldiers to take prisoners of war and to treat them kindly
rests on the Political Section of each unit." [48]

CarpetBombingOppositeWaegwan

In the stretch of mountain country northeast of Waegwan and Hill 303,
the ROK 1st Division daily absorbed

North Korean attacks during the middle of August. Enemy pressure against
this ROK division never ceased for long. Under the strong leadership of
Maj. Gen. Paik Sun Yup, this division fought a valiant and bloody defense
of the mountain approaches to Taegu. American artillery fire from the 1st
Cavalry Division sector supported the division in part of its sector. The
ROK 13th Regiment still held some positions along the river, while the
11th and 12th Regiments engaged the enemy in the high mountain masses of
Suam-san and Yuhak-san, west and northwest of Tabu-dong and 4 to 6 miles
east of the Naktong River. The North Koreans kept in repair their underwater
bridge across the Naktong 6 miles north of Waegwan in front of Hills 201
and 346. Even direct hits on this bridge by 155-mm. howitzers did not seem
to damage it seriously. [49]

The enemy penetration at the middle of August in the ROK 13th Regiment
sector and along the boundary in the 5th Cavalry sector at Waegwan and
Hill 303, together with increasingly heavy pressure against the main force
of the ROK 1st Division in the Tabu-dong area, began to jeopardize the
safety of Taegu. On 16 August, 750 Korean police were stationed on the
outskirts of the city as an added precaution. Refugees had swollen Taegu's
normal population of 300,000 to 700,000. A crisis seemed to be developing
among the people on 18 August when early in the morning seven rounds of
enemy artillery shells landed in Taegu. The shells, falling near the railroad
station, damaged the roundhouse, destroyed one yard engine, killed one
Korean civilian, and wounded eight others. The Korean Provincial Government
during the day ordered the evacuation of Taegu, and President Syngman Rhee
moved his capital to Pusan. [50]

This action by the South Korean authorities created a most dangerous
situation. Swarms of panicked Koreans began to pour out on the roads leading
from the city, threatening to stop all military traffic. At the same time,
the evacuation of the city by the native population tended to undermine
the morale of the troops defending it. Strong action by the Co-ordinator
for Protection of Lines of Communication, Eighth Army, halted the evacuation.
Twice more the enemy gun shelled Taegu, the third and last time on Sunday
night, 20 August. At this time, six battalions of Korean police moved to
important rail and highway tunnels within the Pusan Perimeter to reinforce
their security. [51]

Just as the enemy attack on Waegwan and Hill 303 began, mounting concern
for the safety of Taegu-and reports of continued enemy concentrations across
the river opposite the ROK 1st and the U.S. 1st Cavalry Divisions in the
Waegwan area-led to an extraordinary bomb-

ing mission. On 14 August, General MacArthur summoned to his Tokyo office
General Stratemeyer, commanding general of the Far East Air Forces, and
told him he wanted a carpet bombing of the North Korean concentrations
threatening the Pusan Perimeter. [52] General Stratemeyer talked with Maj.
Gen. Emmett (Rosie) O'Donnell, Jr., commanding general of the Far East
Bomber Command, who said a relatively good job of bombing could be done
on a 3-by-5 mile area. General MacArthur's headquarters selected a 27-square-mile
rectangular area 3 1/2 miles east to west by 71/2 miles north to south
on the west side of the Naktong River opposite the ROK 1st Division. The
southeast corner of this rectangle was just north of Waegwan. Intelligence
estimates placed the greatest concentrations of enemy troops in this area,
some estimates being as high as four enemy divisions and several armored
regiments, totaling approximately 40,000 men. [53]

General Gay, commanding the 1st Cavalry Division, repeatedly requested
that the bombing include the area northeast of Waegwan, between the Naktong
River and the Waegwan-Tabu-dong road. This request was denied because of
fear that bombing there might cause casualties among the 1st Cavalry and
ROK 1st Division troops, even though General Gay pointed out that terrain
features sharply defined the area he recommended. General Gay also offered
to have 1st Cavalry Division L-19 planes lead the bombers to this target.
[54]

FEAF ordered a five-group mission of B-29's from Japan and Okinawa for
16 August. Since there was no indication of enemy groupings in the target
area, the bomber command divided it into twelve equal squares with an aiming
point in the center of each square. One squadron of B-29's was to attack
each square.

At 1158, 16 August, the first of the 98 B-29's of the 19th, 22d, 92d,
98th, and 307th Bomber Groups arrived over the target area; the last cleared
it at 1224. The bombers from 10,000 feet dropped approximately 960 tons
of 500- and 1,000-pound general purpose bombs. The bomber crews reported
only that the bombs were on target. General O'Donnell was in the air over
the target area for more than two hours, but he saw no sign of enemy activity
below. [55]

General Walker reported to General MacArthur the next day that the damage
done to the enemy by the "carpet bombing of 16 August could not be
evaluated." Because of smoke and dust, observation, he said, was difficult
from the air and the impact area was too far to the west to be observed
by U.S. and ROK ground troops. Ground patrols sent out to investigate the
bombed area never reached it. One 1st Cavalry Division patrol did not even
get across the river, and enemy fire stopped another just after it crossed.
The U.N. Command could not show by specific, concrete evi-

dence that this massive bombing attack had killed a single North Korean
soldier. [56] Information obtained later from prisoners made clear that
the enemy divisions the Far East Command thought to be still west of the
Naktong had, in fact, already crossed to the east side and were not in
the bombed area. The only benefit that seemingly resulted from the bombing
was a sharp decrease in the amount of enemy artillery fire that, for a
period after the bombing, fell in the 1st Cavalry and ROK 1st Division
sectors.

Generals Walker, Partridge, and O'Donnell reportedly opposed future
massive carpet bombing attacks against enemy tactical troops unless there
was precise information on an enemy concentration and the situation should
be extremely critical. The personal intercession of General Stratemeyer
with General MacArthur caused the cancellation of a second pattern bombing
of an area east of the Naktong scheduled for 19 August. [57]

BowlingAlley-TheSangju-TaeguCorridor

The 27th Infantry Regiment of the 25th Division had just completed its
mission of clearing the North Koreans from the southern part of the Naktong
Bulge area in the 24th Division sector when the enemy pressure north of
Taegu caused new alarm in Eighth Army headquarters. Acting on the threat
from this quarter, Eighth Army on 14 August relieved the regiment from
attachment to the 24th Division and the next day ordered it northward to
Kyongsan in army reserve. Upon arrival at Kyongsan on 16 August, Colonel
Michaelis received orders to reconnoiter routes east, north, northwest,
and west of Kyongsan and be prepared on army orders to counter any enemy
thrusts from these directions. During the day, two enemy tanks came through
the ROK 1st Division lines twelve miles north of Taegu at Tabu-dong, but
ROK 3.5-inch bazooka teams knocked out both of them. [58]

At noon the next day, 17 August, Eighth Army ordered the 27th Infantry
to move its headquarters and a reinforced battalion "without delay"
to a point across the Kumho River three miles north of Taegu on the Tabu-dong-Sangju
road "to secure Taegu from enemy penetration" from that direction.
ROK sources reported that a North Korean regiment, led by six tanks, had
entered the little village of Kumhwa, two miles north of Tabu-dong.

The 1st Battalion, 27th Infantry; a platoon of the Heavy Mortar Company;
and the 8th Field Artillery Battalion, less B Battery, moved north of Taegu
at noon. Later in the day this force moved two miles farther north to Ch'ilgok
where the ROK 1st Division command post was located. By dark, the entire
27th Regiment was north of Taegu on the Tabu-dong road, reinforced by C
Company, 73d Tank Battalion. Alarm spread in Taegu where artillery fire
to the north could be heard. Eighth Army

rdered the 37th Field Artillery Battalion, less A Battery, to move from
the Kyongju-P'ohang-dong area, where a heavy battle had been in progress
for days, for attachment to the 27th Infantry Regiment in order to reinforce
the fires of the 8th Field Artillery Battalion above Taegu. It arrived
there the next day. [59] To the south at this same time the critical battle
at Obong-ni Ridge and Cloverleaf Hill was still undecided.

In its part of the Perimeter battle, the N.K. 13thDivision
had broken through into the Tabu-dong corridor and had started driving
on Taegu. This division had battled the ROK 11th and 12th Regiments in
the high Yuhak-san area for a week before it broke through to the corridor
on 17 August. A regimental commander of the division said later it suffered
1,500 casualties in achieving that victory. On 18 August the 13thDivision was concentrated mostly west of the road just north of
Tabu-dong. [60]

To the west of the 13th, the N.K. 15thDivision
also was now deployed on Yuhak-san. It, too, had begun battling the ROK
1st Division, but thus far only in minor engagements. At this critical
point, the North Korean High Command ordered the 15thDivision
to move from its position northwest of Tabu-dong eastward to the Yongch'on
front, where the N.K. 8thDivision had failed to advance
toward the Taegu lateral corridor. The 15th left the Yuhak-san area
on or about 20 August. Meanwhile, the N.K. 1stDivision on
the left, or east, of the 13th advanced to the Kunwi area, twenty-five
miles north of Taegu. The North Korean command now ordered it to proceed
to the Tabu-dong area and come up abreast of the 13thDivision
for the attack on Taegu down the Tabu-dong corridor.

At this juncture, the North Koreans received their only large tank reinforcements
during the Pusan Perimeter fighting. On or about 15 August, the 105thArmoredDivision received 21 new T34 tanks and 200 troop
replacements, which it distributed to the divisions attacking Taegu. The
tank regiment with the N.K. 13thDivision reportedly had
14 tanks. [61]

This was the enemy situation, with the 13thDivision astride
the Sangju-Taegu road just above Tabu-dong and only thirteen miles from
Taegu, when Eighth Army on 18 August ordered the 27th Infantry Regiment
to attack north along the road. At the same time, two regiments of the
ROK 1st Division were to attack along high ground on either side of the
road. The plan called for a limited objective attack to restore the ROK
1st Division lines in the vicinity

of Sokchok, a village four miles north of Tabu-dong. The line of departure
was just north of Tabu-dong. Pershing M26 tanks of C Company, 73d Tank
Battalion, and two batteries of the 37th Field Artillery Battalion were
to support the 27th Infantry. [62]

As the trucks rolled northward from Tabu-dong and approached the line
of departure, the men inside could see the North Koreans and ROK's fighting
on the high hills overlooking the road. The infantry dismounted and deployed,
Colonel Check's 1st Battalion on the left of the road and Colonel Murch's
2d Battalion on the right of it. With tanks leading on the road, the two
battalions crossed the line of departure at 1300. The tanks opened fire
against the mountain escarpments, and the rumble of their cannonade echoed
through the narrow valley. The infantry on either side of the road swept
the lower hills, the tanks on the road pacing their advance to the infantry's.
An enemy outpost line in the valley withdrew and there was almost no opposition
during the first hour. This enemy outpost line proved to be about two and
a half miles in front of the main positions. The 27th Infantry had reached
a point about two miles north of Tabu-dong when Colonel Michaelis received
a message stating that neither of the ROK regiments on the high ground
flanking the valley road had been able to advance. He was ordered to halt
and form a perimeter defense with both battalions astride the road. [63]

The two battalions of the 27th Infantry went into a perimeter defense
just north of the little mud-thatched village of Soi-ri. The 1st Battalion,
on the left of the road, took a position with C Company on high ground
somewhat in advance of any other infantry unit, and with A Company on a
ridge behind it. On their right, B Company, somewhat in advance of A Company,
carried the line across the stream and the narrow valley to the road. There
the 2d Battalion took up the defense line with E Company on the road and
east of it and F Company on its right, while G Company held a ridge behind
F Company. Thus, the two battalions presented a four-company front, with
one company holding a refused flank position on either side. A platoon
of tanks took positions on the front line, two tanks on the road and two
in the stream bed; four more tanks were back of the line in reserve. The
artillery went into firing positions back of the infantry. Six bazooka
teams took up positions in front of the infantry positions along the road
and in the stream bed. [64] The ROK 1st Division held the high ground on
either side of the 27th Infantry positions.

In front of the 27th Infantry position, the poplar-lined Taegu-Sangju
road ran northward on a level course in the narrow mountain valley. A stream
on the west closely paralleled it. The road was nearly straight on a north-south
axis through the 27th Infantry position and for some distance northward.
Then it veered slightly westward. This stretch of

A little more than a mile in front of the 27th Infantry position the
road forked at a small cluster of houses called Ch'onp'yong-dong; the left-hand
prong was the main Sangju road, the right-hand one the road to Kunwi. At
the road fort, the Sangju road bends northwestward in a long curve. The
village of Sinjumak lay on this curve a short distance north of the fork.
Hills protected it against direct fire from the 27th Infantry position.
It was there, apparently, that the enemy tanks remained hidden during the
daytime.

Rising abruptly from the valley on the west side was the Yuhak-san mountain
mass which swept up to a height of 2,700 feet. On the east, a similar mountain
mass rose to a height of 2,400 feet, culminating two and a half miles southward
in towering Ka-san, more than 2,900 feet high at its walled summit. This
high ground looks down southward into the Taegu bowl and gives observation
of the surrounding country.

The Kunwi and Sangju roads from the northeast and northwest entered
at Ch'onp'yong-dong the natural and easy corridor between Yuhak-san and
Ka-san leading into the Taegu basin. The battles of the Bowling Alley took
place just south of this road junction.

The first of seven successive enemy night attacks struck against the
27th Infantry defense perimeter shortly after dark that night, 18 August.
Enemy mortars and artillery fired a heavy preparation for the attack. Two
enemy tanks and a self-propelled gun moved out of the village of Sinjumak
two miles in front of the 27th Infantry lines. Infantry followed them,
some in trucks and others on foot. The lead tank moved slowly and without
firing, apparently observing, while the second one and the self-propelled
gun fired repeatedly into F Company's position. The tank machine gun fire
seemed indiscriminate, as if the enemy did not know the exact location
of the American positions. As the tanks drew near, a 3.5-inch bazooka team
from F Company destroyed the second one in line. Bazooka teams also hit
the lead tank twice but the rockets failed to ex-

THE TAEGU FRONT Page 357

plode. The crew, however, abandoned the tank. Fire from the 8th Field
Artillery Battalion knocked out the self-propelled gun, destroyed two trucks,
and killed or wounded an estimated hundred. Lt. Lewis Millett, an artillery
forward observer, and later a Medal of Honor winner after he transferred
to the infantry, directed this artillery fire on the enemy with a T34 tank
within fifty yards of his foxhole. Three more enemy tanks had come down
the road, but now they switched on their running lights, turned around,
and went back north. Half an hour after midnight the entire action was
over and all was quiet. Enemy troops made a second effort, much weaker
than the first, about two hours later but artillery and mortar fire dispersed
them. [65]

Certain characteristics were common to all the night battles in the
Bowling Alley. The North Koreans used a system of flares to signal various
actions and to co-ordinate them. It became quickly apparent to the defending
Americans that green flares were used to signal an attack on a given area.
So the 27th Infantry obtained its own green flares and then, after the
enemy attack had begun, fired them over its main defensive positions. This
confused the attacking North Koreans and often drew them to the points
of greatest strength where they suffered heavy casualties. The use of mines
in front of the defensive positions in the narrow valley became a nightly
feature of the battles. The mines would stop the tanks and the infantry
would try to remove them. At such times flares illuminated the scene and
pre-registered artillery and mortar fire came down on the immobilized enemy
with fatal results.

On the morning of 19 August, the ROK 11th and 13th Regiments launched
counterattacks along the ridges with some gains. General Walker ordered
another reserve unit, a battalion of the ROK 10th Regiment, to the Taegu
front to close a gap that had developed between

the ROK 1st and 6th Divisions. In the afternoon he ordered still another
unit, the U.S. 23d Infantry, to move up and establish a defense perimeter
around the 8th and 37th Field Artillery Battalions eight miles north of
Taegu. The 3d Battalion took up a defensive position around the artillery
while the 2d Battalion occupied a defensive position astride the road behind
the 27th Infantry. The next day the two battalions exchanged places. [66]

Sunday, 20 August, was a day of relative quiet on the Taegu front. Even
so, United States aircraft attacked North Korean positions there repeatedly
during the day. The planes began their strafing runs so close in front
of the American infantry that their machine gun fire dotted the identification
panels, and expended .50-caliber cartridges fell into friendly foxholes.
General Walker visited the Taegu front during the day, and later made the
statement that enemy fire had decreased and that Taegu "certainly
is saved." [66]

By contrast, that night was not quiet. At 1700, a barrage of enemy 120-mm.
mortar shells fell in the Heavy Weapons Company area. A bright moon silhouetted
enemy tanks against the dark flanking mountains as they rumbled down the
narrow, green valley, leading another attack. Artillery and mortar fire
fell among them and the advancing enemy infantry. Waiting Americans held
their small arms and machine gun fire until the North Koreans were within
150-200 yards' range. The combined fire of all weapons repulsed this attack.

three tanks went up the road toward the enemy positions. White flags
had appeared in front of the American line, and rumors received from natives
alleged that many North Koreans wanted to surrender. The patrol's mission
was to investigate this situation and to form an estimate of enemy losses.
The patrol advanced about a mile, engaging small enemy groups and receiving
some artillery fire. On its way it completed the destruction with thermite
grenades of five enemy tanks disabled in the night action. The patrol also
found 1 37-mm. antitank gun, 2 self-propelled guns, and 1 120-mm. mortar
among the destroyed enemy equipment, and saw numerous enemy dead. At the
point of farthest advance, the patrol found and destroyed an abandoned
enemy tank in a village schoolhouse courtyard. [68]

That evening at dusk the 27th Infantry placed an antitank mine field,
antipersonnel mines, and trip flares across the road and stream bed 150
yards in front of the infantry line. A second belt of mines, laid on top
of the ground, was placed about 100 yards in front of the buried mine field.

Later that evening, 21 August, the North Koreans shelled the general
area of the 27th Infantry positions until just before midnight. Then the
N.K. 13thDivision launched a major attack against the ROK
units on the high ground and the Americans in the valley. Nine tanks and
several SP guns supported the enemy troops in the valley. Because it was
on higher ground and more advanced than any other American unit, C Company
on the left of the road usually was the first to detect an approaching
attack. That evening the C Company commander telephoned that he could hear
tanks out front. When the artillery fired an illuminating shell he was
able to count nineteen vehicles in the attacking column on the road. The
tanks and self-propelled guns, firing rapidly, approached the American
positions. Most of their shells landed in the rear areas. Enemy infantry
moved forward on both sides of the road. Simultaneously, other units attacked
the ROK's on the high ridges flanking the valley.

American artillery and mortar fire bombarded the enemy, trying to separate
the tanks from the infantry. Machine gun fire opened on the N.K. infantry
only after they had entered the mine field and were at close range. The
Pershing tanks in the front line held their fire until the enemy tanks
came very close. One of the American tanks knocked out the lead enemy tank
at a range of 125 yards. A 3.5-inch bazooka team from F Company knocked
out a SP gun, the third vehicle in column. The trapped second tank was
disabled by bazooka fire and abandoned by its crew. Artillery and 90-mm.
tank fire destroyed seven more enemy tanks, three more SP guns, and several
trucks and personnel carriers. This night battle lasted about five hours.
The fire from both sides was intense. On the American side, a partial tabulation
shows that in support of the 2d Battalion, 27th Infantry, B Battery, 8th
Field Artillery Battalion (105-mm. howitzers), fired 1,661 rounds, the
4.2-inch mortar platoon fired 902 rounds, the 81-mm. mortar platoon fired
1,200 rounds, and F Company itself fired 385

60-mm. mortar rounds. The enemy column was destroyed. Patrols after
daylight counted enemy dead in front of the perimeter position, and on
that basis, they estimated the North Koreans had suffered 1,300 casualties
in the night battle. Eleven prisoners captured by the patrol said the action
had decimated their units and that only about one-fourth of their number
remained. [69]

The men of F Company, 27th Infantry apparently coined the name Bowling
Alley during the night battle of 21-22 August. The enemy T34 tanks fired
armor-piercing shells straight up the road toward the American positions,
hoping to knock out the American tanks. The balls of fire hurtling through
the night and the reverberations of the gun reports appeared to the men
witnessing and listening to the wild scene like bowling balls streaking
down an alley toward targets at the other end. [70]

During the night battle, enemy forces infiltrated along the high ridge
line around the east flank of the 27th Infantry and appeared the next day
about noon 6 miles in the rear of that regiment and only 9 miles from Taegu.
This enemy force was the 1stRegiment of the N.K. 1stDivision which had just arrived from the Kunwi area to join in the
battle for Taegu. It brought the main supply road of the 27th Infantry
under small arms fire along a 5-mile stretch, beginning at a point 9 miles
above Taegu and extending northward. [71]

About this time, Colonel Michaelis sent an urgent message to Eighth
Army saying that the ROK troops on his left had given way and that "those
people are not fighting." Prisoners told him, he said, that about
1,000 North Koreans were on his west flank. He asked for an air strike.
[72]

It must not go unnoticed that all the time the 27th Infantry and supporting
units were fighting along the road, the ROK 1st Division was fighting in
the mountains on either side. Had these ROK troops been driven from this
high ground, the perimeter position of the 27th Infantry Regiment would
have been untenable. Several times the ROK troops came off the mountains
in daytime looking for food in the valley and a bath in the stream. But
then, supported by the American artillery, they always climbed back up
the heights and reoccupied the high ground. The ROK 1st Division must receive
a generous share of the credit for holding the front north of Taegu at
this time.

General Paik bitterly resented Colonel Michaelis' charge that his men
were not fighting. He said he would like to hold the valley position with
all the tank and artillery support given the 27th Regiment while that regiment
went up on the hills and fought the night battles

with small arms. The Eighth Army G-3 staff investigated Colonel Michaelis'
charge that the ROK troops had left their positions. KMAG officers visited
all the ROK 1st Division units. The Assistant G-3 went to the ROK front
personally to inquire into the situation. All reports agreed that the ROK
units were where General Paik said they were. [73]

The afternoon of 22 August, Lt. Col. James W. Edwards' 2d Battalion,
23d Infantry, guarding the support artillery behind the 27th Infantry,
came under attack by the N.K. 1stDivision troops that had
passed around the forward positions. The regimental commander, Col. Paul
L. Freeman, Jr., reported to Eighth Army at 1640 that the enemy had shelled
the rear battery of the 37th Field Artillery Battalion, that enemy riflemen
were between the 27th and 23d Regiments on the road, and that other enemy
groups had passed around the east side of his forward battalion. An intense
barrage began falling on the headquarters area of the 8th Field Artillery
Battalion at 1605, and 25 minutes later two direct hits on the fire direction
center utterly destroyed it, killing four officers and two noncommissioned
officers. The individual batteries quickly took over control of the battalion
fires and continued to support the infantry, while battalion headquarters
displaced under fire. [74]

Air Force, Navy, and Australian planes delivered strikes on the enemy-held
ridge east of the road and on the valley beyond. These strikes included
one by B-26's employing 44,000 pounds of bombs. That night, General Walker
released control of the 23d Infantry, less the 1st Battalion, to the 1st
Cavalry Division with orders for it to clear the enemy from the road and
the commanding ground overlooking the main supply road. [75]

A bit of drama of a kind unusual in the Korean War occurred north of
Tabu-dong on the 22d. About 1000, Lt. Col. Chong Pong Uk, commanding the
artillery regiment supporting the N.K. 13thDivision, walked
up alone to a ROK 1st Division position three miles north of Tabu-dong.
In one hand he carried a white flag; over his shoulder hung a leather map
case. The commanding general of the 13thDivision had reprimanded
him, he said, for his failure to shell Tabu-dong. Believing that terrain
obstacles made it impossible for his artillery fire to reach Tabu-dong
and smarting under the reprimand, Chong had deserted.

Colonel Chong, the highest ranking prisoner thus far in the war, gave
precise information on the location of his artillery. According to him,
there were still seven operable 122-mm. howitzers and thirteen 76-mm. guns
emplaced and camouflaged in an orchard four and a half miles north of Tabu-dong,
in a little valley on the north side of Yuhak-san. Upon receiving this
information, Eighth Army immediately prepared to destroy the enemy weapons.
Fighter-bombers attacked the orchard site with napalm, and

During the night of 22-23 August, the enemy made his usual attack against
the 27th Infantry, but not in great force, and was easily repulsed. Just
before noon on the 23d, however, a violent action occurred some distance
behind the front line when about 100 enemy soldiers, undetected, succeeded
in reaching the positions of K Company, 27th Infantry and of the 1st Platoon,
C Company, 65th Engineer Combat Battalion. They overran part of these positions
before being driven off with fifty killed. [77]

Meanwhile, as ordered by General Walker, the 2d Battalion, 23 Infantry,
after repelling several enemy night attacks, counterattacked at dawn, 23
August, and seized the high ground overlooking the road at the artillery
positions. At the same time the 3d Battalion started an all-day attack
that swept a 3-mile stretch of high ground east of the road. This action
largely cleared the enemy from the area behind and on the flanks of the
27th Infantry. At 1335 in the afternoon, Colonel Michaelis reported from
the Bowling Alley to Eighth Army that the N.K. 13thDivision
had blown the road to his front, had mined it, and was withdrawing. [78]

The next day, 24 August, the 23d Infantry continued clearing the rear
areas and by night it estimated that there were not more than 200 of the
enemy behind the forward positions. The Bowling Alley front was quiet on
the 24th except for an unfortunate accident. An Eighth Army tank recovery
team came up to retrieve a T34 tank that had stopped just in front of the
forward American mine field. As the retriever began to pull the T34 forward,
an American mine unseen and pushed along in some loose dirt underneath
the tank, exploded, badly damaging the tank and wounding twelve men standing
nearby. [79]

Shortly after midnight of 24 August the North Koreans launched what
had by now become their regular nightly attack down the Bowling Alley.
This attack was in an estimated two-company strength supported by a few
tanks. The 27th Infantry broke up this fruitless attempt and two more enemy
tanks were destroyed by the supporting artillery fire. This was the last
night the 27th Infantry Regiment spent in the Bowling Alley. The confirmed
enemy loss from 18 to 25 August included 13 T34 tanks, 5 self-propelled
guns, and 23 vehicles. [80]

With the enemy turned back north of Taegu, General Walker on 24 August
issued orders for the 27th Infantry to leave the Bowling Alley and return
to the 25th Division in the Masan area. The ROK 1st Division was to assume
responsibility for the Bowling Alley, but the U.S. 23d Regiment was to
remain north of Taegu in its support. ROK relief of the 27th Infantry began
at 1800, 25 August, and continued throughout the night

until completed at 0345, 26 August. On 30 August the regiment received
orders to move from near Taegu to Masan, and it started at 0800 the next
morning, personnel going by train, vehicles by road. The Wolfhound Regiment
completed the move by 2030 that night, 31 August. [81] And a very fortunate
move it proved to be, for it arrived in the nick of time, as a later chapter
will show.

As if to signalize the successful defense of the northern approach to
Taegu in this week of fighting, a 20-year-old master sergeant of the ROK
1st Division executed a dangerous and colorful exploit. MSgt. Pea Sung
Sub led a 9-man patrol 6,000 yards behind the North Korean lines to the
N.K. 13thDivision command post. There his patrol killed
several enemy soldiers and captured three prisoners whom they brought back
with no loss to themselves. General Paik gave the daring sergeant 50,000
won ($25.00) for his exploit. [82]

Colonel Murch's 2d Battalion and Colonel Check's 1st Battalion, 27th
Infantry, had gained something of a reputation for themselves in the Bowling
Alley north of Taegu. The defense in depth behind their front line by the
2d and 3d Battalions, 23d Infantry, had frustrated all enemy efforts to
gain control of the gateway to Taegu. The supporting tanks and the artillery
had performed magnificently. During the daytime, Air Force attacks had
inflicted destruction and disorganization on the enemy. And on the mountain
ridges walling in the Bowling Alley, the ROK 1st Division had done its
full share in fighting off the enemy thrust.

Survivors of the 1stRegiment, N.K. 1stDivision,
joined the rest of that division in the mountains east of the Taegu-Sangju
road near the walled summit of Ka-san. Prisoners reported that the 1stRegiment was down to about 400 men and had lost all its 120-mm.
mortars, 76-mm. howitzers, and antitank guns as a result of its action
on the east flank of the N.K. 13thDivision at the Bowling
Alley. [83]